Roy Halladay

CLEARWATER, Fla. — Calvary Christian High School’s Nolan Hudi couldn’t believe what he was seeing on Twitter. Someone had replied to a picture of him flying with Roy Halladay with a wish that the former major league pitcher would rest in peace.

Hudi texted a screenshot of the tweet to Halladay, laughing it off as fake. He’d seen Halladay, his team’s pitching coach, less than 24 hours earlier at their first fall baseball game. Hudi then called Braden Halladay, Roy’s son and a teammate. Sensing Braden’s nervousness, he told Braden to call his mother, but that there was no way it could be real.

“I texted Roy: ‘Roy, are you there? I haven’t heard from you,’” Hudi said. “And he didn’t answer. I said, ‘Roy?’ That was the last text I ever sent Roy. He never responded.”

It was Nov. 7, 2017.

The news then spread quickly that Halladay was dead. His ICON A5 aircraft had crashed into the Gulf of Mexico just off the Florida coast. Halladay, who spoke often of his love of flying, was 40.

In this April 4, 2014 file photo, Roy Halladay salutes the crowd at the Toronto Blue Jays’ season opener.Dave Abel /
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His death shook players who had competed with and against Halladay, a two-time Cy Young Award winner and eight-time All-Star. Many of them released statements praising him as a family man, a consummate teammate and a hard worker. Carlos Ruiz, a former teammate of Halladay’s on the Philadelphia Phillies, said he was “devastated.”

So was Calvary Christian’s baseball team. A group of players went to the home of Halladay, who had grown close to many of them in his only year as pitching coach, and cried with his son Braden in his room.

“Just a sad day,” Calvary Christian coach Greg Olsen said. “For his family, I just wanted to make sure we could do everything in that moment and moving forward to be there for them.”

The next day, Olsen gathered his players in the school’s church sanctuary and told them that they would work through Halladay’s death together.

“We were kind of looking for a theme” for the 2018 season, Hudi said. “We all knew this is it: We’re doing it for Roy. There really was no question about it.”

The Warriors won all three of their extra-inning games and seven one-run games. Tommy White, a freshman with a .243 batting average, had two game-deciding hits. The pitching staff finished with a 1.05 ERA over 207 innings, and the lineup averaged more than seven runs a game.

“The stuff that we’ve been able to accomplish isn’t normal,” Hudi, now a senior, said. “I helped out with the freshman team. Something I told them is to be a student of the game and watch the game, but I jokingly said, ‘don’t watch our games, because our games are storybook. That’s not baseball. Something special is happening.’”

To be sure, Calvary Christian’s excellent 2018 season wasn’t much of a surprise. The prior year, the Warriors had won all 30 of their games and a Class 4A state championship. All six Division I commits on that team also returned.

But it wasn’t enough. Calvary Christian won 30 consecutive games in 2018 to reach the Class 4A state championship game again, but lost, 5-1. Still, the Warriors won 60 consecutive games over two years, the most by a Florida high school baseball team.

Halladay’s impact was apparent.

Hudi, who credits Halladay with improving his delivery and preparation, was 13-0 with a 0.44 ERA over 80 innings this season. He wrote Halladay’s name in the dirt on the mound and put his hand over the imprint during big innings. He sometimes touched Halladay’s jersey, which usually hung in the dugout, to calm down.

Braden Halladay, now a senior, was the team’s No. 2 pitcher, finishing 7-1 with a 2.12 ERA over 46 1/3 innings. He described himself in an email as a “projectable” pitcher because of his 6-foot-3, 150-pound body. His father was 6-foot-6 and 225 pounds, meaning the younger Halladay will probably have an opportunity to add muscle mass and velocity to his 83-84 mph fastball.

“He taught me every pitch I know,” Braden wrote in an email. “Things my dad taught me were being confident with every pitch and throwing everything with the same intensity and arm slot.”

Roy Halladay’s family â his sons Ryan (left) and Braden (right) and his wife, Brandy â stand on the field during a tribute to the late former pitcher before the Toronto Blue Jays’ season opener on March 29.Ernest Doroszuk /
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Calvary Christian senior shortstop Christian Cairo spent about a month on the bench with Roy Halladay last season while recuperating from a broken left hand. He considers that time a blessing.

“I didn’t think of it until lately, but I got to sit with Roy and talk to him about details of the game and learn stuff from him, pitching, hitting, the mental side,” said Cairo, whose father, former New York Yankees and Mets infielder Miguel Cairo, also serves as an assistant coach. “He was a great mentor.”

Former Calvary Christian catcher Matheu Nelson said Halladay taught him how to be more effective in his role.

“He would heckle the other kids from the other teams more than we would,” Nelson said. “That shows you his competitiveness.”

Three days before Halladay’s crash, Nelson was at the coach’s home when Halladay, planning to fly his plane, said he would be willing to take Nelson with him. His only request: for Nelson not to tell his parents.

When they were in the air, Nelson said, Halladay turned to him and said it was his turn to fly. Nelson, who had never flown a plane, was shocked, but took over after Halladay told him to be careful because the controls were sensitive.

“He let me fly the plane for, like, five to 10 minutes,” Nelson said. “It was a fantastic and absolutely breathtaking experience, especially for the first time.”

Nelson was hitting with Christian Cairo when he learned that Halladay was dead. A few days later, Nelson got a tattoo that read, “R.H. ’77-’17. 34Ever,” a reference to Halladay’s initials, years lived and jersey number while with the Phillies, right over his heart.

The tattoo will serve as a permanent reminder of Halladay’s impact in just a short time.

“He’s still in the back of our minds,” Nelson said. “We still play for him. He’s still our coach. He still means everything to us, whether he’s here or not.”

When my assistant said there was a call from the White House, I picked up, said 'Hello' and started to ask if this was a prank

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